Elliot Moore to Participate in NAE Educational Symposium

Elliot Moore will take part in the National Academy of Engineering’s 2014 Frontiers of Engineering Education Symposium, to be held Oct. 26-29 in Irvine, California.

An associate professor in the Georgia Tech School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE), Moore will be among 77 young engineering faculty members selected from across the U.S. to participate in this event. He and his colleagues were chosen for their work in developing and implementing innovative educational approaches in various engineering disciplines. At this event, Moore and his colleagues will share ideas and bring back concepts to their home institutions for best practices, innovation, and continued commitment to improving teaching methods.

Moore has explored using technology to increase student engagement since first joining the ECE faculty in 2004. First based at the Georgia Tech-Savannah campus, he taught many students who were at remote locations. To help improve teacher-student interaction, Moore used Tablet PCs paired with Dyknow software to allow transmission of content between himself and each student – and vice versa. Through this method, he was able to engage every student through polls and exercises and use their responses to fuel discussion across local and remote sites.

Since moving to Georgia Tech’s Atlanta campus in 2013, Moore has joined ECE’s Innovative Education Committee, which is dedicated to improving the School’s learning environment. He is now modifying his previous work at GT-Savannah to address student engagement in a required undergraduate course that has over 200 students. In place of Dyknow and Tablet PCs, Moore is utilizing the Triton Data Collection System, or “clickers,” which allow for in-class polling and exercises designed to encourage attendance and preparation for lecture. The “clickers” are also used for assessment exams, scheduled before traditional written exams, to encourage students to think critically about what they are learning prior to taking the full written exam.

Moore will join four more Georgia Tech College of Engineering faculty members – Alexander Alexeev and Baratunde Cola of the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering; Kamran Paynabar of the H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering; and Manu Platt of the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering – at this event, making Georgia Tech the institution with the most participants at the symposium.